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Where is the Equity?

When I say “Where is the equity” I am questioning the ever increasing number of those in poverty, the “poor”, while the obscenely wealthy just keep getting more obscenely wealthy. Sometimes it totally eludes me that people seem to be so terrified of “socialism” they cannot see the gap between rich and poor is not increasing because there are people producing more opportunities for production and employment, but because their wealth is being manufactured by printing worthless money, increasing the national debt, while making the low income pay for it, and bringing more illegal immigrants into the country to compete for already scarce jobs. The United States is producing substantially more unskilled part-time jobs than full-time skilled jobs.

There is compelling psychological research which scientifically measures the changes in behavior subsequent to wealth disparities. The more wealth people have, the more more likely they are to embrace more pernicious behaviors. They are more likely to cheat, accept something for nothing, take from others, disregard the feelings of others, feel superior and ‘entitled’ to their blessings while viewing the less fortunate as inferior and deserving of their misfortunes. Of course there are the affluent who discredit the sources of this research with absolutely no evidence to falsify the material presented in these studies. http://www.econedlink.org/interactives/index.php?iid=282

Most honest people acknowledge there are people with genuine needs for charitable assistance. However, they seem to disregard these genuine needs when they stereotype anyone and everyone who receives any type of charitable assistance. The facts are that 80% of charitable contributions come from the lowest 20% of income. Difficult as it may be for some to believe, most of the charitable contributions come from people who qualify for charitable contributions themselves. Perhaps they are more acutely aware of the profound difficulties associated with poverty; or perhaps those who are more affluent and can afford to be more generous may be more like the scientific studies have determined. Regardless of the merit of government assistance and methodology in computing poverty, the United States has established a long-standing pattern of electing representatives who love to spend other people’s money in their altruistic efforts to assist the most vulnerable element of society. If there are so many people who resent the government providing these funds (while corporate welfare and tax privilege is ignored) then they should elect people who will gradually shift this type of funding from the government to private resources rather than arbitrarily voting to terminate these services without providing alternatives. Cutting off funding for people who depend upon those funds is no different (other than humanitarian factors) than terminating workers without notice or to feed and care for a pet, and then leave them locked in a house with no food, expecting the pet to find some alternative means of caring and feeding itself.

It is also an unfortunate fact which anyone who has ever worked with homelessness and poverty can attest to, that government charity is established in such a fashion as to keep people receiving government assistance. Instead of maximizing the dedication of resources to determining how to avoid poverty or elevate those in poverty into self reliance, bureaucrats establish COC (Continuum of Care) criteria which will keep people in poverty. If bureaucrats won the war on poverty they would be out of work. The fundamental priority of government workers seems to be more focused upon job security than solving the problems they are hired to solve. Once again, job security trumps altruism.

Solutions? Absolutely!

1. Elect people who will ween government dependency to private charitable resources.
2. Quit using tax-payer funds (other people’s money) to subsidize ‘good intentions’.
3. Stop passing laws which grant special privileges to legislators.
4. Stop using tax-payer funds to interfere in the free market by granting those with the greatest wealth the greatest privilege and political leverage.
5. Let the free market forces of supply and demand determine which business enterprises will fail or prosper.
6. Enforce the laws which have already been passed and were NOT discretionary.
7. Quit deferring government and corporate costs for incompetence and imprudence to the taxpayer.
8. Restore traditional ‘core values’ of our Constitutional Republic.